Heart Legacy

by Robin D. Owens

  When the tresses slid across his fingers, caressing them, he couldn’t prevent thrusting into her body, once, twice, stopped before a third stroke would have him pounding into her. She didn’t need that, more fast loving.

  So he slid his fingers through her hair, straightening the strands, enjoying the different textures of Lori. All of her was soft, but her hair waved more than he’d noticed, she’d braided it so tight. Again and again he slipped his hand through it, found it came to her midback . . . and he rocked inside her and listened to her quiet whimpers.

  He was pleasing her, stoking her slowly to orgasm, exactly as he wanted. He listened intently to her little breaths, how they hitched, paid attention to how her hand on his biceps clutched.

  Control, with control he could make this exquisite pleasure on the knife edge of pain last and last. Move slowly, thrusting just a little deeper every few strokes. So. Damned. Good. Just. Plain. Perfect.

  She began to rock, as if needing more of his cock, and harder thrusting in particular places. Her eyes had closed, a woman caught in primal instinct, focused on herself and her impending climax. Her lips had flushed, as had her hard nipples and her skin. Beautiful.

  Her head tilted back, her mouth opened, and he couldn’t resist; he kissed her, thrusting his tongue like he plunged with his shaft, and she screamed into his mouth as she trembled with her orgasm.

  He kept moving, knowing he skated on the edge of his self-mastery; soon it would unravel.

  “Wonderful,” she murmured. “But it’s better when you’re with me.”

  His heart slammed against his chest at that great sentiment and broke his control. He rolled her under him and surged hard as far his cock would go. Basic instinct to mate ruled and he withdrew to his tip at her entrance, giving himself maximum pleasure. Her rolling chuckle of delight came to his ears, her legs wrapped around his waist giving him better access, but now it was all about wringing the most ecstasy out of him during the best sex he’d ever had in a fast, pounding course to soaring orgasm.

  She gasped and convulsed around him, clamping around his cock.

  Utter rapture blasted through him and he arced, back bowing, his hands under her ass and taking Lori with him as he exploded into motes of light and life and the spiral of fabulous sensation spun him out, going on and on and on.

  When he came back to himself, he lay on her, felt every indentation of her body. With supreme effort, he rolled over, but she escaped his limp grasp and lay on her side while his vision fixed on the ceiling. “Sorry. I’ll be able to look at you. Someday. Sometime soon, maybe.”

  She giggled, and a weightless joy filled his chest, through his being, flushing the burden of guilt away.

  He’d made love to her, given her satisfaction, pleasure, orgasm. And made her giggle.

  They stayed in silence for a while, and their breathing kept rhythm.

  Lori couldn’t take her gaze from her lover. He lay on his back, his chest pumping up and down, lightly sheened with sweat. She stared at his penis, flaccid but yet thick and long. Nearly as beautiful as his defined muscles. She didn’t think she’d ever get tired of looking at his body.

  A low chuckle rolled from him and her gaze traveled from his sex up his abdomen to that nice, wide chest, then his face and smug expression. “Like what you see?”

  Impish humor tingled through her. She moved her hand to his shaft, curled her fingers around it. “Studly.”

  He jerked. “What?”

  “I know studly when I see it. You’re very virile, Draeg.” She leaned close and kissed him on his lips, which appeared plump from sex and arousal and kissing. He tasted different, more earthy, after sex. She liked it, found herself humming a purr as if she were Baccat.

  Experimentally, she moved her hand up and down his penis and his whole body stiffened—such an effect on his entire body from touching his cock. “Excellent reflexes there, GentleSir Hedgenettle,” she teased.

  He stiffened even more, shaft and body, but she sensed it wasn’t due to the same emotion, so she checked their bond and found some kind of distress.

  She could banish that. Head tilted to watch his penis grow erect under her stroking, she moved her hand up and down from base to tip, saw his small nipples tighten to hard beads, his skin flinch and his teeth clench as he sought control.

  She loved seeing the changes in him, feeling his arousal under her hand, how he became erect, thickened. Her own pulse raced and she clenched her legs as the anticipation of pleasure dampened her inner core and the folds of her own sex.

  “Too much,” he gasped, and pushed her hand away from his fascinating shaft, pushed her to her back and put his mouth on her breast.

  Glorious pleasure! Tugs that made her wet, her legs restless, created a craving in her for sex, more for Draeg and Draeg alone inside her, joining with her, experiencing shattering climax together.

  Her nipple hardened under his swirling, darting tongue. Then he lifted his head enough for her to see his glinting sapphire eyes. He lowered his head and gently, gently rasped her skin with his beard as he moved over to her other breast. This time he kissed her breast, laving all around her nipple but not taking it into his mouth until she arched upward.

  His hand trailed down between her thighs, and his fingers feathered over her, then dipped inside her entrance and a long, broken moan sifted from her. She could only feel. Physical sensation ruled her; only the quest for climax mattered.

  One of his fingers penetrated her, and his thumb moved over the top of her sex and his lips played with her nipple, and waves of bliss washed through her, gaining strength and potency, collected into one massive tide of feeling ripping through her that crested, then broke, and she heard her own shrill cry before she subsided limply onto the bedsponge.

  The minute she could catch her breath and open her eyes, she did, surprising a fiercely concentrated expression on his face.

  He took her fingers and brought them to his shaft. “Show me you want me, put me into you.” His voice was so low she could barely hear him, and rough.

  She swallowed as another quiver—either aftermath or prefatory—fluttered through her. Lashes down, she regarded her pale hand around his darker sex, slid him between her legs, drew his erection into her. “Draeg,” she whispered.

  “Loridana,” he lilted back, sliding into her. She closed her eyes and savored the friction and the joining, then moved her hands to his strong shoulders to feel him flex there as they made love.

  A second later she thought she heard something and frowned. Then more noise that her mind insisted she notice. Then the clatter of feet on the boathouse deck, testing the door she’d locked. Imminent discovery! Move! “Eeek!” she cried out, bit that off and shook Draeg by the shoulders until he stopped moving. “Teleport now!”

  Twenty-six

  Tapping came at the door. Draeg tensed and nodded admission of the danger. “I can help—”

  “Port!” she ordered in the command tone that she’d been taught but rarely used.

  Scowling, he drew out of her, away from her, leaving a chill behind, and vanished. Her heart clutched as she realized he hadn’t finished his orgasm. Deal with that later, institute emergency measures now! She scrambled off the bedsponge. It had to go! She translocated it away, to the first place she thought of: the rickety secondary summer pavilion.

  “Whirlwind Spells, workclothes here, add recent stains and perspiration!” Good thing she’d memorized such a spell. The thing whisked her around, scrubbed her sex-sweat away, layered on physical-labor perspiration and the scent of wood varnish. She coughed.

  Three Whirlwind Spells in one day, punishment enough for her breaking so many rules.

  Quick, quick, quick, move onto the next step!

  When she got her lungs working right again, she squeaked out a brand-new Flaired couplet she’d memorized that morning, a housekeeping spell to remove the odor of sex and replace it with a general herbal fragrance.

  “Loridana?” called Zus.

&nb
sp; Teleport to the main room, yank off the tarp over the cabinet, snap open a can of varnish, and pull liquid into a brush she’d translocated from a table, into the can, then into her hand. Brighten the light in this area! Turn on the music flexistrip player set to be unheard from outside.

  Lord and Lady, the amount of Flair she was using!

  She hurried to the door and yanked it open to see a surprised Vi and Zus with dropped mouths.

  “Yes?” She tilted her head. “You didn’t knock or call very loudly.”

  Zus raised his arm and ostentatiously looked at his wrist timer. “It took you long enough to open the door.”

  “Music,” she said, then waved the dripping brush toward the corner where she supposedly worked. Droplets flicked from the brush to speckle Zus’s trous suit; Vi jumped back in time.

  “Stup!” Zus snarled.

  “Are you sure you don’t have an alarm on this place so it will tell you to return when the atmosphere is disturbed by other people?”

  Lori stared at her, blinked, let her own mouth fall open. “What? What are you talking about?” She frowned as if examining Vi’s words. “There’s a spell for that?” Lori blinked again, then nodded. “Oh, yes, like the one I have on the stables to notify us of intruders. But that sounds a siren.”

  “Stup,” Zus said again. He’d finished brushing at his clothes with a cleansing spell, then pushed her aside as they walked in. Vi wrinkled her nose at the stringent smell in the main room, and Lori hurried over to wipe the excess varnish off her brush and placed it across the open can, as if ready to resume work when her visitors left.

  She caught up with them in the kitchen as they opened and closed cabinets—already refinished—and Vi checked idly on the no-time that held a moderate amount of snacks. She studied the dates the food was supplied, but Lori had been canny, there, too. She was good at planning and delayed gratification.

  The twins stalked through the boathouse and Lori trailed after them. When they strolled through the small bedroom, she stuck her hands in her pockets, flexed her fingers. As far as she could tell, nothing seemed out of order. What might they sense, though?

  Vi sniffed.

  Lori fisted her hands, realized the telling gesture, and pulled them from her pockets and forced her fingers to relax by her side, stopping herself from speaking nervously.

  “This room has not been rehabilitated.”

  Rolling a shoulder, Lori said, “The common areas for Family meetings and gatherings are prioritized.”

  “By whom?” Zus asked, striding back to the doorway and shoving her aside with his body when she didn’t move fast enough to get out of his way.

  “The Residence, of course,” Lori answered, staying in the dim hallway until Vi exited the bedroom.

  “Of course,” Vi mocked.

  Since she thought it would look odd if she returned to work right after they’d studied the bedroom, Lori continued to follow them. How small and ordinary the chamber had seemed without the vitality of Draeg filling it up. The place had zero ambience. That was twice she’d picked very unromantic spots to have sex with him—the stables, and here. Embarrassment twisted her insides.

  Finally, she joined the twins where they stood in the lit corner of the main room, Zus sneering at her music. “We didn’t even find the cat,” Zus said disgustedly.

  “Cat hair, varnish, and stain don’t mix,” Lori pointed out.

  “Have you been here all night?” Zus’s voice demanded an instant answer.

  “Since I left the Residence after dinner,” Lori responded, quickly and truthfully, her manner totally open.

  Their annoyed expression emphasized the similarities of their features.

  Then Vi said, “What a dull and lonely life you have.” She raised perfect brows. “Or do you?”

  Yes, the mocking note in Vi’s voice told Lori that they were checking up on her, had thought to find the place empty and to report that to Cuspid, Folia, and the Residence. But Lori shrugged, cleaned off the brush by hand, and capped the varnish.

  “You wanted to tour the boathouse? You have. Anything else?”

  Vi aimed a haughty glance at Lori. “The Residence wishes to speak with you.”

  “What, now?”

  “Would we be here if it weren’t now?”

  “No.”

  “You’re right,” Zus said. His lip curled as he scanned her up and down. “I suppose there is no time for you to change clothes.”

  “Except for a Whirlwind Spell,” Vi said.

  “You know the Residence disapproves of me using those,” Lori said; had Vi sensed such Flair, or something else? Lori continued, “It means I didn’t calculate my time and my schedule and events wisely.” She lifted her chin. “If the Residence wants to see me now, then it will expect to find me in work clothes, won’t it?” She spared them both a glance. “I’m surprised you’re acting as messengers.”

  “You’re right, I have more rewarding things to do.” Zus snorted and teleported away.

  “The house said to meet with it in the ResidenceDen,” Vi instructed, and vanished, too.

  Lori sagged, more from the aftereffects of the earlier adrenaline dump than relief, and sudden weariness. Checking that everything was in order, she banished the spellglobe, turned off the music player, left, and locked the door.

  Walking through the night, she tried to appreciate the swath of bright stars in the infinite blackness of the Celtan sky, but the temperature had plummeted to freezing and she didn’t have a coat. Something in the atmosphere felt a great deal like the night before. She passed the place by the steps where she’d landed with her broken leg, and understood that she’d never enjoy running up and down these stairs again.

  So she concentrated on the warmth, the heat, she and Draeg had generated in the boathouse. She’d always associate the boathouse with him, and she smiled, felt a little warmer, and scrounged up enough Flair to surround herself with a weathershield.

  She sent a mental call to him. Draeg?

  I’m here. Anything I can do to help?

  No. She smiled at the offer, and with no strings attached, no expectation of a favor in return, a nearly unique experience for her. I’ve always had plans in place in case of discovery. But it was a near thing. If we hadn’t been in the boathouse—

  I’d have thought of something to cover for you, he sent to her. An emergency in the stables I needed you for.

  She opened her mouth in surprised relief, again at his help and cleverness. As if she weren’t alone in conspiring against the Residence and the Family. Did she dare contemplate asking him for help with her other plans?

  Lori?

  The Residence needs to speak with me. I’m almost there. She paused, let appreciation and affection with a touch of sexual desire flow from her to him through their bond. Thank you for being with me tonight.

  She received back what she’d sent: appreciation, affection, more than enough sexual desire to heat her up.

  I should say that, too, Draeg said. Thank you for being with me, Loridana.

  He lilted the syllables of her long name, and she liked hearing it; perhaps that’s why he said it that way.

  Good night, sleep well.

  Take care, call for me if you need me. Solid determination shot through their bond from him.

  Good night, she repeated, and gently pinched their bond shut, acknowledging that hearing from the Residence at this time of night when it thought she was in the middle of a project was not at all a good thing.

  As she proceeded through the Residence, she touched her bond with Baccat. I am speaking with the Residence shortly, she stated. Then I’ll head to bed.

  Whose decision was this? Baccat went straight to the heart of the matter.

  His, the Residence’s.

  I am at the southeast gate of the city. I will teleport to My shed.

  There’s nothing you can do. Please continue scouting. Perhaps for streets that will allow three or four beasts across, so they feel comfortable.
>
  I am aware of our requirements. I requested an up-to-date map from the PublicLibrary Cats. She sensed grooming of whiskers. One of Them fancies Me. As soon as I obtain the map, I will return. I remind you that if necessary, you can teleport to the HouseHeart, who will shelter you.

  I am low on Flair, but thank you.

  You are welcome. I will speak to you later. I am marking down a septhour to contact you. A pause. Also if necessary, I can teleport to the stables and have the man run to the house with an emergency you must solve.

  Two minds, Draeg’s and Baccat’s, with nearly the same thought. Two accustomed to teamwork and sharing responsibilities. Rather sad that her brain hadn’t been able to come up with that notion. Thank you. Later.

  Later! Baccat said. She sensed his nose twitching at the scent of mouse—prey.

  At the door to the ResidenceDen, she drew herself up into the posture the entity would expect—spine and shoulders straight, chin high—opened the door, and closed it behind her.

  “You have kept me waiting,” the Residence said.

  “I was not informed of the specific time you wished to see me.” She walked with dignity to her usual wing chair.

  “I believe ‘as soon as possible’ speaks for itself.” A window rattled, once, in punctuation.

  “I’m sorry, the twins did not relay that particular information, nor that you wanted me to teleport. I wished to get out into the night after varnishing cabinets in the boathouse mainspace. It’s a beautiful night, though cold.”

  A floorboard cracked like a human snort. “I have been informed you have been leaving the estate and wandering around Druida City itself.”

  Instant shock and fear, immediately suppressed, but the Residence would have sensed it. She couldn’t hesitate too long, and if she lied, the Residence might catch her in lies, or she might trip herself up now, or forget her lies later.